Saturday, 21 June 2014

The tranquil Slough Arm …

… though probably not if you’re cruising it!

We arrived back at Packet Boat marina after a fairly easy journey considering the heat and summer Saturday traffic. Unsurprisingly, the boat was like an oven. Not for the first time we wished we had Houdini hatches!
We are not moving till Monday, as tomorrow we are travelling to a family wedding near Cambridge. So after a rather late lunch, we took Meg for a walk along the Slough Arm for a couple of miles. If you ignore the motorway noise, it’s calm and peaceful, and very attractive too apart from the odd patch of litter. This is the view from one of the three aqueducts we crossed.

We had wondered whether it was worth taking the boat to Slough, to say we’d done it, but changed our minds quickly …..

There was a lot of blanket weed as well as the ‘proper’ water-weeds. And it’s not just boats that would have a problem – this terrapin wasn’t having an easy time of it at all. I took this picture on our way out, and he hadn’t got much further when we returned half an hour later. Perhaps he was just sunbathing.

The water was very clear where there was no blanket-weed and we saw hundreds of fish – some really tiny fry, but a couple of shoals of little perch, and also bleak, rudd, bream and a couple of small pike. I had a go at taking a snap of some perch, but without much luck. However Dave spotted this lovely fish – it was quite big and he thought it might be a chub or even a barbel. Update: a couple of people have pointed out that it's a carp - thanks to both.

We won’t be taking Chuffed up the Arm, and it’s too weedy for fishing, but it’s nice enough for walking.

4 comments:

Thanks for the pictures. We've struggled up there for the last 3 or 4 years to the Slough festival and every year say never again! After seeing this we wont be doing it this year.Great pictures though and such a shame.Julie

Hi Julie,If they do up the end of the arm so it's worth the journey it might encourage more boats to keep the weed down - but I think it'll need a weed-cutter first. We're on our way down the Paddington Arm now and there's blanket weed here too - must be the hot weather!What's your boat name? we'll look out for youDebby